Forty years later, Europe must remain the solution

For Spain, this accession fulfilled its desire to find the definitive antidote to its severely deteriorated overall clinical picture.

It was José Ortega y Gasset who, in Bilbao in 1910, diagnosed the problem and prescribed the cure in a single sentence: ‘Spain is the problem, Europe is the solution’. But since then, we have had to endure three quarters of the 20th century suffering serious upheavals, violent bouts of fever and periodic deterioration in our general health. The (Un)Civil War, followed by the harsh post-war period and a long dictatorship, were the episodes that left the deepest scars and consequences on Spain's severely infected general organism.

The avalanche of correspondents who arrived in our country on the occasion of Francisco Franco's death had an undisguised hidden motive: to witness another brutal confrontation between Spaniards, with which to write chronicles and stories that would ultimately prove that Spain was genetically incapable of functioning as a normal, democratic country without resorting to knives, stabbings or executions for ideological incompatibility.

Sidelined from the international concert of nations since the Congress of Vienna in 1815, the Spanish did not have an easy time achieving integration into Europe. From the very creation of the European Common Market (ECM) in 1957, the Franco regime at the time submitted its candidacy, which was naturally rejected as it required a democratic political system, i.e. freedom, as a sine qua non condition. Despite this, and despite having been excluded from the manna of Marshall Plan funds, which played a decisive role in the reconstruction of Europe, Spain took small steps to adapt as much as possible to European economic structures, an alignment that would experience a definitive boost from the so-called Transition, the accelerated peaceful process of reconciliation and political change, which would greatly disappoint those who expected the Spanish to engage in another civil war, and greatly astonish chancelleries around the world by demonstrating that it is possible to transition from a dictatorship to a democracy without bloodshed. However, it should not be forgotten that what seriously marred those years (1975-1986) was the terrorism of those who did not accept that Spain could live and progress in freedom and unity, mainly ETA, but also some other groups involved in kidnapping, extortion and bombings.

All these tragedies were literally swept away by the enthusiasm aroused in Spaniards by their full incorporation into Europe, acknowledging with that expression that, even though geographically we had not moved from our place, Spain had morally and economically broken away from the continent.

In a short time, Spaniards witnessed, but above all experienced, a gigantic transformation of the country, from its undeniable economic prosperity and the consequent joint progress of its society, to the articulation of the country thanks to the development of road infrastructures that in many cases surpassed, in terms of modernity, those that had been in place for years in the rest of the European Union.

The dismantling of obsolete industries certainly caused social tragedies, but those affected were also able to see that the country as a whole, and the European club, came to their aid without leaving them out in the cold. The same happened with Spain's backward agriculture, which, thanks to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), was modernised, lifting farmers out of their traditional poverty and multiplying agri-food entrepreneurship to the point where Spain became a leader in this important and necessary industry.

As if that were not enough, the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty on 1 January 1993 and the single market; the Schengen Agreement, with its corresponding free movement of people, goods and capital (1995); and the adoption of the euro as the single European currency (2002) have shaped and formed a European society without borders, envied and also besieged by those who see it more as an overly powerful competitor than as a stabilising force in the numerous tensions ravaging the world.

In this transformation, which is not only political but above all social, the Erasmus Programme is playing a decisive role, to the extent that 200,000 Spanish students have become truly “European” by having completed part of their university education in another EU country. Such is the prestige acquired by the programme, which was decisively promoted in its day by the Spanish Commissioner and Vice-President of the European Union, Manuel Marin, that the British have decided to reintroduce this student exchange despite not yet having reversed Brexit. It is also true that this broader, more European vision facilitates the departure of many privileged minds to other European countries that are more dynamic in terms of providing them with decent jobs and remuneration.

Accustomed throughout history to a permanent state of war, today's Europeans, including Spaniards of course, may be experiencing a certain weariness with tranquillity and even softness. See, in this regard, the unequal diligence among member countries in the application and allocation of NextGeneration funds, the latest major continental project to bring Europe into the new era of digitalisation and artificial intelligence, and where Spain has not exactly distinguished itself by investing them in the most appropriate way.

If the founders of a united and prosperous Europe demonstrated a brilliant vision of the future, followed by generations of Europeans who aspired to see Europe become the third great power in the world, alongside the United States and the Soviet Union, those who govern European institutions today have been overwhelmed by the strength of the Americans, but also by an unstoppable China.

The race to occupy the best geopolitical space is leaving Europe behind, which no longer has any companies in the world's top twenty, a barometer that marks its decline, accentuated by the latest major global conflicts. Brussels, as the capital of the EU, should accept as soon as possible that our traditional friend and ally, the United States, has broken the so-called transatlantic link. And that, in this situation, it must face up to the aggressiveness of Russia, which every day demonstrates its unwillingness to negotiate an agreement to end its war of destruction and conquest in Ukraine.

Of course, the European solution does not lie in returning to the mosaic of states of the past; it would be the end if, in addition, any of those nations were to break up into small confederated states. On the contrary, more Europe is needed, but with the requirement for true leadership that puts an end to the current mediocrity and the abundance of empty and repetitive meetings and communiqués. Leaders who put the big issues at the forefront, from common defence to technological innovation, from energy self-sufficiency to food self-sufficiency, including strong support for the maintenance of free trade. And, of course, since no one is giving up their own international agenda, there must be strong external coordination to prevent Europe's growing irrelevance at the tables where the fate of the world is decided, while we witness personal struggles to try to occupy the best place on the stage.

It is a decisive dilemma for Europe and for Spain. Either they abandon their interest in the superfluous, if not harmful, under the guise of woke policies that are as costly as they are ineffective, or the lack of integrative progress could put an end to the EU, the best project of free and voluntary association of men and nations who knew no other way to live than in war against each other.